iZettle

What iZettle does

iZettle, founded in 2010 in Stockholm, Sweden by Jacob de Geer, built a mobile point-of-sale platform targeting small and medium-sized businesses across Europe. Its core product is the PayPal POS App (formerly iZettle), a free mobile application available on iOS 12+ and Android 8+, paired with compact card readers that connect via Bluetooth and a countertop PayPal Terminal with built-in POS software. The platform supports credit and debit card payments, contactless NFC transactions including digital wallets, gift cards, and Tap to Pay functionality on compatible smartphones, all processing exclusively through PayPal's payment infrastructure. Sales analytics, inventory management with low-stock alerts, and integrations with ecommerce and accounting software are bundled into the same application.

The company's business model centers on pay-as-you-go transaction fees, with no monthly or startup charges, supplemented by hardware sales of card readers and terminals and a working capital lending product underwritten by WebBank and repaid as a share of PayPal sales. Prior to its acquisition, iZettle pursued a primarily product-led growth strategy with self-serve SMB onboarding and an enterprise channel partnership with Verifone for omnichannel deployments. It raised approximately $326 million in venture funding across multiple rounds from 2010 through 2017, with strategic investors including American Express, Mastercard, Intel Capital, and Index Ventures, before being acquired by PayPal Holdings Inc. in 2018 for approximately $2.2 billion, at the time PayPal's largest acquisition. Following integration, iZettle was rebranded first as PayPal Zettle and then as PayPal Point of Sale in 2023, operating today as a product line within PayPal's broader business payments ecosystem serving SMBs in Sweden, the United Kingdom, the United States, and other markets.

Name

iZettle

Legal name

PayPal Holdings Inc.

Website

https://zettle.com

Company type

Private

Founded year

2010

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

501–1,000 employees

Short description

iZettle, founded in 2010 in Stockholm and rebranded as PayPal Point of Sale, provides a mobile and countertop point-of-sale platform combining a free iOS/Android app with card readers and terminals, serving small and medium-sized businesses with pay-as-you-go payment processing under the PayPal ecosystem.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

Mobile Point-of-Sale (POS) Payments

akta.pro primary industry

POS Terminal Hardware (Countertop, Mobile, PIN Pads) (FSAMADAA)

akta.pro secondary industries

POS Payment Software & Middleware (Terminal OS, Apps, Device Management) (FSAMADAC), In-Store Contactless & NFC Acceptance (Tap-to-Pay, EMV Contactless) (FSAMADAF), POS, SoftPOS & In-Person Acceptance Infrastructure (FSAGABAO), QR Code & Alternative In-Store Acceptance (QR, APMs) (FSAMADAH)

Keywords

• Mobile point of sale
• Contactless payment processing
• POS card readers
• Small business payments
• Merchant working capital

Headquarters

HQ city

Stockholm

HQ country

Sweden

HQ region

Europe

Markets served

GTM type

B2B

Offering type

Software

Cost components

Technology or R&D, Personnel, Infrastructure, Marketing or Sales, Operations, Supply Chain

Revenue model

1. Transaction Fees: Standard fee per transaction processed through the POS system. No monthly fees, startup fees, or long-term commitments. Pay-as-you-go model where merchants only pay when they receive payments.
2. Hardware Sales: Sale of POS hardware including card readers and terminals to merchants who want dedicated hardware rather than using Tap to Pay on their existing devices.
3. Working Capital Loans: Business loans provided to qualified merchants based on their account history, with repayment through automatic share of PayPal sales. Generates interest income through WebBank partnership.

Pricing tiers

Go-to-market motion2 records

Distribution channels2 records

Marketing channels4 records

Core offering

iZettle provides small and medium-sized businesses with a unified mobile point-of-sale (POS) system comprising a free POS mobile application for iOS and Android and optional hardware (a Bluetooth Card Reader for portable use and an all-in-one Terminal for countertop operations). The platform processes in-person payments including chip, swipe, contactless cards, and digital wallets, alongside inventory management, sales analytics, and working capital loans integrated with PayPal's broader payment infrastructure. Following PayPal's 2018 acquisition, the product is offered as PayPal Point of Sale, with an enterprise tier delivered through a Verifone partnership.

Product overview

PayPal Point of Sale (formerly iZettle/Zettle) is a unified point-of-sale platform acquired by PayPal, comprising complementary hardware and software products. The core offering centers on the PayPal POS App (available for iOS and Android), which can be paired with optional hardware — the PayPal Card Reader for mobile/portable use or the PayPal Terminal for full-featured countertop operations. The Tap to Pay feature enables contactless payments using just a smartphone. Additional services include PayPal Working Capital loans and an enterprise-tier solution delivered via Verifone partnership. The platform integrates ecommerce and accounting tools and processes transactions exclusively through PayPal's payment infrastructure.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Products and services

• PayPal Point of Sale (formerly Zettle / iZettle) Unified point-of-sale platform enabling businesses to accept in-person payments via customizable hardware and software, including the PayPal POS App, Card Reader, Terminal, and Tap to Pay capability. Targeted at small and medium-sized businesses that need an affordable, easy-to-deploy POS system.
• PayPal Card Reader Compact hardware device that syncs with the PayPal POS App on a mobile device to accept in-store card payments including contactless, chip, and swipe. For small businesses needing portable payment acceptance.
• PayPal Terminal All-in-one hardware device with built-in POS app, inventory management, and payment processing capabilities for more comprehensive business operations at a fixed checkout.
• PayPal POS App Free mobile application for iOS and Android that powers the PayPal Point of Sale system, enabling product management, inventory tracking, sales analytics, discount application, and payment processing. Available as a standalone download for businesses that don't need additional hardware.
• PayPal Working Capital (Business Loan) Business loan service offered to qualified PayPal merchants, with eligibility primarily based on PayPal account history and repayments automatically deducted as a percentage of PayPal sales. Underwritten through WebBank.
• PayPal Enterprise POS (Verifone partnership) Enterprise-grade omnichannel point-of-sale solution provided through the strategic Verifone partnership, enabling global in-person selling across industries and markets for large enterprise customers.

Quantifiable outcome

• Complete onboarding in just minutes
• +1 more outcomes

Segments2 records

Ideal customer profiles2 records

Technology focussed Yes

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Feature5 records

Partnerships

One partnership is on record.

• VerifonecoreChannel Partner/ Reseller/ DistributorStrategic partnership with Verifone provides enterprise customers with a global, omnichannel POS solution. This partnership enables enterprise businesses across industries and markets to access PayPal's in-person payment capabilities through Verifone's established enterprise distribution network.

Scale indicators2 records

Recent moves6 records

Expansion highlights4 records

Direct peers

• Block (Square): Square pioneered the mobile card-reader-based POS for SMBs — the direct US analog to iZettle — and has since expanded into a full SMB software, banking, and lending ecosystem, making it the most directly comparable peer in product, target customer, and business model.
• SumUp: SumUp is a European-headquartered mobile POS and card reader provider targeting micro and SMB merchants across 30+ markets, competing head-to-head with iZettle in the same geographies with similar hardware-plus-app delivery.
• Stripe Terminal: Stripe Terminal extends Stripe's online payments stack into in-person acceptance, offering card readers, SDKs, and developer-first APIs — directly overlapping with iZettle's SMB and platform-integrated POS use cases.
• Clover (Fiserv): Clover is a POS hardware-and-app platform serving SMBs across retail and food service, distributed through Fiserv's bank and ISO channels — overlapping with iZettle's hardware-software SMB model and enterprise channel approach.
• Lightspeed Commerce: Lightspeed provides cloud-based POS and commerce solutions to retail and restaurant SMBs globally, with a comparable mix of hardware terminals, software subscriptions, and integrated payments.
• Shopify POS: Shopify POS extends Shopify's e-commerce platform into in-person retail, competing with iZettle for omnichannel SMB merchants who want unified online and in-store commerce — particularly in retail.

Broad incumbents

• Adyen: Adyen is a global payments platform providing unified online and in-person processing for enterprise and large SMB merchants; it is a broader incumbent in omnichannel acceptance that PayPal explicitly cited as a competitor for the iZettle acquisition thesis.
• Worldline: Worldline is a large European payment processor and POS solutions provider, a broader incumbent offering in-person acceptance and merchant services across the same SMB and enterprise segments iZettle serves in Europe.

Emerging players

• Toast: Toast is a vertical-specific POS and payments platform focused on restaurants, a key SMB segment for iZettle; it represents an emerging, deeply integrated payments-plus-software model targeting one of iZettle's core verticals.

Others

• Verifone: Verifone is a global POS hardware and enterprise commerce platform that is both a strategic distribution partner for PayPal's enterprise POS and a comparable provider of in-person payment hardware and software to merchants and acquirers.

Market position

Strengths4 records

Weaknesses4 records

Competitive moat4 records

Key risks6 records

Key highlights7 records

Customer concentration

• Xx.com/izettle
• Facebookfacebook.com/Izettle
• LinkedInlinkedin.com/company/izettle

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles6 records

Funding overview

Funding rounds10 records

Investors21 records

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A1 record

Investments1 record

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about iZettle